2001: Italy’s Leaning Tower of Pisa reopens its doors to tourists after a $27 million effort to keep it from tilting so much it might fall over. Construction began on the tower in 1173. It’s the freestanding bell tower, or campanile, of the cathedral next door. The structures, along with a separate baptistery, make a […]

1984: The Monterey Bay Aquarium opens in California. The aquarium occupies the site of an old sardine cannery at the edge of Monterey Bay, one of the most fertile and diverse marine environments on earth. That diversity inspired the idea of devoting the aquarium solely to the rich marine life indigenous to its own stretch […]

1900: Boston’s Symphony Hall, an acoustical marvel in its day and still regarded as one of the world’s great concert halls, opens with an inaugural concert by the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Unlike most American concert halls, which tend to favor a wider, fan-shaped configuration, Symphony Hall was built along European lines — deep, narrow and […]